


i am a trace i am a gesture

by dizzyondreams



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, jean's dead but not like that he's a cute ghost boy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-04
Updated: 2014-04-04
Packaged: 2018-01-18 04:46:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1415599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dizzyondreams/pseuds/dizzyondreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean was, for a lack of a better word, Eren’s dead boyfriend. Well, he was already dead when Eren met him, some sort of freak accident involving alcohol and an empty swimming pool, so it wasn’t too bad. Eren would probably feel a lot more sorry for him if he wasn’t constantly stealing his smokes, anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i am a trace i am a gesture

Eren waited until his parents had gone to bed before pocketing his cigarettes and his lighter and slipping silently downstairs. Wincing at a creaky floorboard in his kitchen, he flicked the basement lights on before making his way carefully down. It was pitch black out, the clouds covering the moon, and the chill emanated through the thick basement door. Fumbling slightly with the latch, Eren closed the door with a soft click. Opened it again, to check the latch was on, and nodded to himself. Eren could only imagine the resulting fallout if he turned up knocking on the front door, having to explain why he was locked out in the first place.

His breath hung in a cloud in front of him and he hunched his shoulders against the cold, wishing he’d thought to throw a coat on over his pyjamas. A pair of shoes would’ve been a nice thought too, he mused, as he wiggled his already frozen toes in the leaf debris on the floor. 

Eren cast a quick look around his garden, fumbling with his pack of cigarettes, wondering if Jean would turn up tonight. There was no sight of him, but there never was, initially at least. Jean always came, regular like clockwork, but liked to make Eren jump. Sure enough, as soon as Eren lit up, there he was, creeping out of the bushes at the bottom of Eren’s garden, a streak of white against the black. Eren offered him a wave, which was returned.

“Jean.” He whisper-called, and Jean’s figure seemed to waver for a second, and then he was at Eren’s side, cold and pale. Eren gave him a grin, which was met with a smirk and a nod towards Eren’s cigarette, which was currently burning down, forgotten.

“What you smoking?” He said quietly, in a voice like dry leaves. Eren could see the glowing cherry of his cigarette reflected in his pale eyes.

“Menthol, sorry.”

“Wow, puke.” Jean commented, but still wormed his hand into Eren’s pyjama pant pocket to extract his pack of smokes and a lighter. 

Jean was, for a lack of a better word, Eren’s dead boyfriend. Well, he was already dead when Eren met him, some sort of freak accident involving alcohol and an empty swimming pool, so it wasn’t too bad. Eren would probably feel a lot more sorry for him if he wasn’t constantly stealing his smokes, anyway. 

“Shut the fuck up. It was all I could get my friends to buy.” Eren muttered around an exhale of smoke, and Jean laughed his whispery laugh and lit up. Eren had been impressed to discover he could still smoke, what with being dead and all. Jean had said it was one of the few pleasures left to him, and had hunched up next to Eren’s side with a mutter of, “Humans are always so warm. I always forget how warm humans are.” That had bummed Eren out, and they’d smoked in silence until Eren finished his cigarette and had slipped back inside.

He’d met Jean when he was sixteen and he’d scared the shit out of him so bad Eren hadn’t been able to go into the garden after dark for weeks. To this day, Jean never let him live it down. Eren had insisted that actually, it was a perfectly reasonable response to a dude materialising out of thin air next to you, but Jean had still laughed until he turned shimmery at the edges. Eren thought that was kinda cute, and spent the next few days reconsidering everything he ever thought about himself.

Needless to say, Eren had never thought he’d end up kissing the physical manifestation of some stuck in the 80s dead kid in his back garden at night. But hey, sometimes life doesn’t turn out like you thought it would and you’ve just gotta roll with the punches. Maybe Jean hadn’t thought he’d end up dead and kissing some abrasive little shit in a cold back garden. 

“How’ve you been?” Jean asked, crowding close to Eren like he always did and muttering a quick, “Shit, sorry,” when he arm passed unpleasantly through Eren’s side. It happened sometimes when Jean wasn’t concentrating. It was a cold, sinking feeling, and Eren wondered if that would be the closest thing they’d ever get to sex. Great, now he was thinking about sex with his ghost boyfriend. Eren’s life was fucking weird.

“Just, y’know.” He shrugged, trailing smoke through the dark. “School. Exams. The usual.”

“Yeah.” Jean breathed reverently, because he clung on to little everyday ordinary shit like that. It was kinda sad, actually. Eren decided not to dwell on it. “Sounds like fun.”

“Not fun.” Eren muttered, thinking about the three classes he was currently failing and the fourth that was almost there. School was currently a black hole for Eren’s happiness, and he didn’t really feel like discussing it. He just bit out a quick, “But that’s just school, right?”

They smoked in silence for a bit, sharing each other’s company. It was a still night, and the smoke from their mouths curled through the air in front of them, hanging there with no breeze to blow it away. Eren wished Jean was a little warmer, not just a cold presence next to him, and resolved to bring a coat next time. 

“What about you?” He asked, giving Jean a sidelong glance that was only meant to last a second before he got caught up in the way Jean looked in the dark. For a dude with frosted tips, he looked good. For a dude who’d been dead for thirty years, he looked damn good. The long, straight line of his nose, his high cheekbones. Eren had lucked out in the dead boyfriend department. Even if his haircut could only be just short of tragic. “How’s life in purgatory.”

“Surprisingly chill.” Jean said easily. “Rattled some chains, did some haunting, opened and closed some cupboard doors. The usual.” He got Eren a pleased grin when he laughed, and took a drag on his cigarette, the cherry glowing bright as he inhaled. “Watched you do your homework.”

Eren raised his eyebrows, grinning, and moved so he was leaning against the wall facing Jean. “You watch me in the shower?”

Jean raised his eyebrows and nodded, exhaling a hanging cloud of smoke. “Yeah, you know, just the usual.”

Eren laughed and went to punch Jean in the side, and grimaced when his hand passed right through. “Dude! Corporeal-ise! We’ve talked about this.”

Jean laughed obnoxiously, the sound dry and thin, and seemed to grow more solid, colour leeching back into him slightly. “Glad to see your education is going to good use.” He shook his head and crossed his arms. “Corporeal-ise. Unbelievable. That’s not even close to being an actual word.”

Eren punched him again, enjoying the feel of solid flesh underneath his hand. “You’re not even close to being an actual word.” He liked it like this, easy and stupid. He yearned to show Jean off to his friends.

“Again, glad to see your public education isn’t failing you.”

They stood in silence a little while longer, Eren finishing off his cigarette and dropping the butt into an empty plant pot. He lit another, and grimaced at the taste. Jean hadn’t finished his yet, maybe due to the fact that he didn’t actually breathe and couldn’t suck it down as quickly as Eren had. He ashed onto the floor, and fixed Eren with a serious look. His eyes were a washed out brown, and Eren wondered how brown they’d been before he’d died. His whole being was muted, from the loud letter jacket he wore, to the high top sneakers and his drainpipe jeans. Eren was actually quite glad: all that 80’s colour would probably give him a headache this late at night. 

“So who’s the blond kid you were studying with?” Jean asked, tone casual but his gaze still needling into Eren’s. He was slouched against the wall, slightly taller than Eren (probably older too, actually. Eren had never thought to ask) so he looked down on him, boxing him in. Eren liked it, liked that Jean was taller and skinny and pale and different in all the ways Eren was not. His hands always looked good against Eren’s dark skin.

“Armin? My friend Armin.” He said, and exhaled into the space between them. He supposed if Jean was alive he’d be radiating heat right now, and Eren might be able to feel the beat of a pulse underneath his fingertips where they rested on Jean’s neck. As always, Jean’s skin was cold and still under his touch. The smell of menthol cigarettes lingered between them, cloying and strong without the breeze to shift it away. Eren stretched up on his tiptoes to press a kiss to Jean’s cool lips.

Jean kissed him back, eager as always, the hand that wasn’t clutching a cigarette grasping hold of his waist. Eren shivered as his t-shirt rode up over one hip as Jean bunched the material up under his hand. He wondered if Jean had had a girlfriend or a boyfriend when he’d died. Jesus, he was morbid.

“Your friend, huh?” Jean murmured, relaxing back against the wall and bringing his cigarette to his lips again. Eren fancied they looked redder after their kissing, but dismissed it as wishful thinking.

“Yeah?” He shot Jean a puzzled look, and angled his face away so he wouldn’t blow smoke at him. A light switched on across the way, and Eren blinked in the sudden light. Jean ashed onto the floor again, and swiped it away with the toe of his ridiculous shoe.

“Okay.” He said simply. Eren waited for him to elaborate, but nothing came. He raised his eyebrows at Jean, who was smoking with a distant expression on his face.

“What? Spit it out.”

“Well, you just look kinda,” Jean shrugged, and raked his hand through his hair, scratching over his undercut before dropping his hand back to his side. “Close.”

“I’ve known him since forever.” Eren said, puzzled. Jean’s eyebrows inched higher, if possible, and Eren laughed suddenly. “Oh my god, you’re jealous.”

Jean gave him a scandalised look. “I am not! You just look close is all.” He hunched in on himself and took an angry drag on the cigarette clamped between his fingers. “I wouldn’t blame you since y’know, I’m fucking dead and all.”

Eren pouted at him. “You’re a fucking idiot.” _Armin_ , Jean thought he was with _Armin_. Who Eren had known since they were both snot-nosed little kids getting under everyone’s feet. Armin, who tried to get Eren interested in books and took a dim view on smoking. He laughed again.

“Excuse me.”

Eren laughed and shook his head, moving to stand chest to chest with Jean, ignoring the chill emanating off him. He put his hands on either side of Jean’s face and squeezed, laughing again at how stupid he looked. “Babe, you’re the only dead boy for me.” He planted a quick kiss on Jean’s lips and let go of his face but didn’t step back. He was pretty sure that if Jean had a body right now, and like, blood, he’d be blushing.

“You mean that?” Jean sounded oddly vulnerable, and Eren felt a pang of sadness deep in his chest. He and Jean had only been hanging out for a year or so. That meant thirty-something years of nothing, or next to nothing anyway. Eren sincerely doubted Jean hadn’t picked up any other stupid alive boys in that time.

“I mean it.” Eren said, and kissed him again, longer this time. It was weird, kissing a ghost. Cold and sort of tingly. Eren couldn’t say he didn’t enjoy it. He nipped Jean’s lip once, and took advantage of Jean’s surprised gasp to press closer and flick his tongue against Jean’s teeth. 

Then Eren found himself pitching forward and hitting his head on the wall with a firm smack. He landed on his ass and cursed, clutching at his forehead. The cigarette had fallen to the floor, abandoned. “Jean, what the fuck.” He gritted out, probing his head gingerly and wincing. There’d be a hell of a bruise there tomorrow. He cast around for Jean, and found him standing a foot away, looking deeply embarrassed and almost completely transparent. “Not cool, asshole.” He muttered, and scooted so he sat with his back against the wall. “What was that.”

Jean joined him, slowly becoming more solid until Eren could see his mortified expression. “I’m sorry.”

“Did you…did you just go fucking ghost on me because I put my tongue in your mouth?” How fucking surreal. Eren’s life was so fucking weird.

Jean had drawn his knees up to his chest and dropped his face into his hands. He still looked slightly see through with embarrassment. “Oh god, I can’t believe I just did that.”

“You’re a fucking idiot.” Eren said, and started laughing at the absurdity of it. “I cannot believe you.”

It took about ten minutes before Jean was solid enough so Eren could lean into his side and press his face into his neck. “Unbelievable.” He muttered. “Lemme tell you, Armin doesn’t go invisible on me when we kiss.” Jean bristled, and Eren laughed again. “Joking! I’m joking, asshole. Like I said, I’m not seeing anyone but you.”

Jean overcame his embarrassment enough to kiss Eren again, lazy and nice. He didn’t disappear when Eren slipped his tongue into his mouth this time, or when Eren slipped a hand under his shirt to graze his fingernails over his hipbone.

“You know, you will date other people.” Jean said a little while after, when Eren had his head resting on his shoulder, slowly succumbing to frostbite and not caring even a little bit. “I mean, you have to move away and I’m like, anchored here or whatever.” He shrugged, rolling Eren’s head off his shoulder as he did so.

“I guess we’ll just deal with that when we come to it.” Eren said lightly. “It’s too late to be thinking about shit like that.” He knew he didn’t want to go to university, but apart from that, nothing in his life was set in stone.

Jean hummed in agreement and laced his cold fingers through Eren’s. 

“You wanna come up and spoon with me? I‘m exhausted.” Eren added, gathering himself to his feet and holding out a hand for Jean to take. He nodded and took it.

“Only if I get big spoon.”

Sometimes it was a real blessing to have a boyfriend that could disappear whenever Eren’s mother walked into the room.

**Author's Note:**

> for erejean week's prompt: jealousy...it's a very tenuous connection to the prompt tbh i just wanted to write ghost boy jean
> 
> title from the song heavy light by dr dog 
> 
> hope u enjoy!!


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